Ligaments are tough bands of tissue which serve to connect the articular extremities of bones, or to support and/or retain organs in place within the body. Ligaments are typically composed of coarse bundles of dense white fibrous tissue which are disposed in a parallel or closely interlaced manner, with the fibrous tissue being pliant and flexible but not significantly extensible.
In many cases, ligaments are torn or ruptured as a result of accidents. Various procedures have been developed to repair or replace such damaged ligaments.
For example, in the human knee, the anterior and posterior cruciate ligaments (i.e., the “ACL” and “PCL”) extend between the top end of the tibia and the bottom end of the femur. The ACL and PCL cooperate, together with other ligaments and soft tissue, to provide both static and dynamic stability to the knee. Often, the anterior cruciate ligament (i.e., the ACL) is ruptured or torn as a result of, for example, a sports-related injury. Consequently, various surgical procedures have been developed for reconstructing the ACL so as to restore substantially normal function to the knee.
In many instances, the ACL may be reconstructed by replacing the ruptured ACL with a graft ligament. More particularly, in such procedures, bone tunnels are generally formed in the top end of the tibia and the bottom end of the femur, with one end of the graft ligament being positioned in the femoral tunnel and the other end of the graft ligament being positioned in the tibial tunnel. The two ends of the graft ligament are anchored in place in various ways well known in the art so that the graft ligament extends between the bottom end of the femur and the top end of the tibia in substantially the same way, and with substantially the same function, as the original ACL. This graft ligament then cooperates with the surrounding anatomical structures so as to restore substantially normal function to the knee.
In some circumstances, the graft ligament may be a ligament or tendon which is harvested from elsewhere in the patient; in other circumstances, the graft ligament may be a synthetic device. For the purposes of the present invention, all of the foregoing are collectively referred to as a “graft ligament”.
As noted above, the graft ligament may be anchored in place in various ways well known in the art. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,590,928, issued May 27, 1986 to Michael S. Hunt et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 4,744,793, issued May 17, 1988 to Jack E. Parr et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 4,755,183, issued Jul. 5, 1988 to Robert V. Kenna; U.S. Pat. No. 4,784,126, issued Nov. 15, 1988 to Donald H. Hourahane; U.S. Pat. No. 4,828,562, issued May 9, 1989 to Robert V. Kenna; U.S. Pat. No. 4,927,421, issued May 22, 1990 to E. Marlowe Goble et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 4,950,270, issued Aug. 21, 1990 to Jerald A. Bowman et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,062,843, issued Nov. 5, 1991 to Thomas H. Mahony, III; U.S. Pat. No. 5,147,362, issued Sep. 15, 1992 to E. Marlowe Goble; U.S. Pat. No. 5,151,104, issued Sep. 29, 1992 to Robert V. Kenna; U.S. Pat. No. 5,211,647, issued May 18, 1993 to Reinhold Schmieding; and French Patent Publication No. 2,590,792, filed Dec. 4, 1985 by Francis Henri Breard.
Despite the above-identified advances in the art, there remains a need for a graft ligament anchor which is simple in construction, inexpensive to manufacture, and relatively easy to handle and install, while providing safe and effective anchoring of the graft ligament, typically in the knee joint of a mammal.
In addition to the foregoing, it has also been found that the quality of the bone receiving the graft ligament can vary significantly from patient to patient and/or from site to site. In particular, it has been found that in many situations, the bone receiving the graft ligament may be of relatively poor quality, in the sense that the bone is relatively soft and/or lacking in a consistent structure. This can make it difficult to easily and reliably anchor the graft ligament to the bone.
Thus, there also exists a need for a graft ligament anchor which can easily and reliably anchor a graft ligament to a bone of relatively poor quality.